Another edition of The Varsity News has been posted on their site.  Episode 36 includes a double dose of Vashon, showing highlights of the Vultures against Seattle Prep as well as hosting Issaquah.  The show also contains footage from the Bainbridge vs Skyline match up.

 

The Division I Stroll…

 

  • Biggest stories from the week that was:

o       Mercer Island took the Northeast Conference crown pulling out a 7-5 showdown with Bellevue.  The win keeps the Islanders perfect at 19-0 this season overall.  The Islanders defense is in a class of its own allowing only 69 goals this season.  Only one other team is even under 100, but that team, King’s Way, has been aided by a softer schedule, a forfeit win and less games played.  The Islanders now head into the playoffs as the #1 overall seed and the favorite to reclaim the State Championship trophy.

o       Plenty of excitement throughout the rest of the Northeast Conference as teams moved up and down and even out of the playoff picture on the final day of the regular season.  Northshore will be sending thank you cards to Eastlake and Skyline as both teams from the Sammamish Plateau took it to Lakeside and in essence ended the Lions season.  Just a week ago, Lakeside had defeated Northshore to put themselves in great position to claim the final berth from the Northeast.  However, the Lions couldn’t overcome an Eastlake team that was dramatically improved the last third of the season.  The following day the Lions lost again to Skyline opening the door back up for Northshore.  All they needed was a crack and the Wisman boys and Co. jumped on the chance, beating Puyallup in a 14-13 nail biter to claim the #6 seed and send Lakeside packing.

o       Skyline had lost earlier in the week to Issaquah to give 4th place back to Overlake.  However, Overlake needed a win to clinch that position after Skyline’s victory over Lakeside.  In a rather odd development, Overlake chose to forfeit its final game at King’s Way for a variety of reasons centered around travel and timing complications.  So, Skyline does in fact earn the #4 seed and Overlake drops to #5.

o       No shake ups in the Southwest as the conference finished just as we predicted last week.   

 

  • Standout Stats:

o       The Parks, Stadium – Martin scored 4 goals, dished 2 assists and picked up 8 groundballs while Aaron added 4 goals himself and Kevin ran down 10 groundballs for good measure.  The trio’s performance helped clinch a playoff berth for Stadium in just their first year at the Division I level.

o       Taylor Wisman, SR, Northshore – Closed an outstanding regular season with 6 goals, 11 groundballs and an assist to boot, to lead Northshore to a thrilling 14-13 victory and seal the last playoff berth in the Northeast Conference.

o       Thomas Brook, SR, Puyallup – Despite a tough loss to Northshore, Brook was simply spectacular.  The long-stick scored 2 goals, dished an assist, recorded 19 groundballs (winning many faceoffs) and still had enough energy to strip Taylor Wisman a few times.

 

o       5/18  Tacoma @ Skyline – Haven’t played since 2007 when both were Division II programs. 

o       5/19  Overlake @ Curtis – Owls gave up a chance to host a home playoff when it forfeited.  Can they swoop in to the Vikings house and pull an upset?

o       5/19  Northshore @ Puyallup – Game was so good last week they decided to play again… this time for all the marbles!

 

The D2 Stroll…

 

  • Biggest stories from the week that was:

o       Blanchet snuffed out any talk of them being involved in a possible 1st round upset as the Braves hammered Providence to end the Highlanders inaugural Varsity season.

o       No surprises in any of the 1st round match ups as all top seeds held.  Lynnwood, Snohomish, Sammamish, Wenatchee, San Juan, Lake Washington and Roosevelt all advanced.  The only game decided by less than 6 goals was Roosevelt’s overtime win over a tough Redmond team.  Certainly stronger on the defensive end, standout netminder, Nico Shewey and defenseman, Clement Signoretty almost helped the Mustangs pull it off.  But not enough offense, and Roosevelt was able to squeak it out as Kevin Ault made 12 saves of his own and Ben Soukup got the game winner for the Roughriders.

 

  • Standout Stats

o       Alex Tindall and Trey Knowles, Lynnwood – How about a little 7 and 7?  We had to leave these two on here as they were at it once again.  In the first round of the playoffs, each scored 7 goals to dispatch of Garfield and send Lynnwood to round two.

o       Michael Bennett, SO, Roosevelt – The midfielder led the way in a low scoring overtime affair to help Roosevelt advance to the 2nd round by scoring three of the Roughriders goals in a 5-4 overtime win.

o       Kyle Skoog and Westin Hedin, San Jaun – The senior duo stepped up to score five goals a piece to lead San Juan past Gig Harbor.

 

  • Best match-ups of the upcoming week:

o       5/21 Sammamish @ Lynnwood – Totems vs Tigers is just the first of four great quarterfinal match-ups.

o       5/21 Snohomish @ Lake Washington – This could easily be the final.  The undefeated Kangs vs many people’s favorite to win it… doozy of a Quarterfinal match up!

o       5/22 Blanchet @ Wenatchee – Can the Braves enact revenge from the regular season loss or will a team from the east make the final four?

o       5/22 Roosevelt @ San Juan – Another green and gold match up!  Could one of the DII semifinals be played on San Juan Island?

 

Lacrosse The Country…

 

Onondaga Community College captured the NJCAA National Championship last weekend.  The squad includes former Mercer Island, All-American, Daniel Shields as well as two other locals that red-shirted for the squad this year, Harrison Valentine (Redmond) and Devin Cavanaugh (Curtis).

Washington Stealth fanatics, the Green Men have earned national attention as the group has been seen on ESPN’s Sportscenter as well as discussed on the NLL Insider.  The group is comprised of students and players from Overlake.

Caldwell Rohrbach (Garfield) was named to the Liberty League 1st Team at attack for Saint Lawrence.  He was one of five players to be a unanimous selection.

 

Three former Bainbridge All-Americans were all named to the Eastern College Athletic Conference’s 1st or 2nd team.

 

 

Lacrosse Four Thought…

Who got snubbed from the Division I All-State Teams or the Division II All-Conference Teams?

What do you think of the All-American selections?

Will the Stealth’s NLL Championship lead to even greater season ticket sales next season?

Why hasn’t San Juan top midfielder, Forest Dayton, played since April 24th? 

 

Parting Shots…

 

·        “Just to point out a couple of inaccuracies, we do not draw from 13 schools.  This year we represent 7 schools with the mass of that coming from 3 schools.  We have a total of 6 kids in the entire program from the other 4 schools.  I believe there are a large number of other programs which draw from a number of schools as well. Although we do have a Varsity, JV1 and JV2 program, we only have just over 50 kids on the roster and we do not cut kids, we welcome anyone who wants to play.  All but about 7 of our JV1 players also play some time at the JV2 level as well.” – Dave Holler, King’s Way

·        “Lake Washington is a first year program as well.” – Chris Bright     **We do not wish to take away from Lake Washington’s incredible season and true this is the first year of the Lake Washington program.  However, it should be noted that much of Lake Washington’s program (including their top two scorers) moved over from Redmond and did in fact play in Division II last year, so we did not look at Lake Washington as a true first year program.

·        “Bellevue last beat Mercer Island in April of 2002 at Mercer Island by a score of 9-8.  The offense was led by Bellevue’s All American, Attackman, Andy Young (3g, 2A) who’s physical style was a compliment to the sneaky play of his attack running mate,Brandon Deal (3g, 1A).  Brandon’s younger brother Ryan is having a great year as a starting attackman for Bellevue this season. The Bellevue defense was led by goalie Matt Stanley who had 19 saves in the game and lockdown defensemen Dylan Larrivee.  Mercer Island’s offense was led by future ’03 All Americans, Luke Lasron (2g, 2a) and Brad Gillis (2g). Defensively Mercer Island had Joey Solazzi in cage and he didn’t disappoint with 14 saves.  Bellevue would Face Mercer Island again in the semi’s that season and fall 7-6 yielding a goal with under a minute remaining…to initiate what is now a 7 year winning streak over Bellevue.” – Chris Bergin

 

We’ll give a shot to the best emails of the week and include your comments/quotes/etc in next week’s Sunday Stroll.

Time to hear from you!  Feed us your thoughts, edits, questions… bring it!          EMAIL: TheSundayStroll@gmail.com